A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 



churches, commissions were issued in the four deaneries of Carlisle, 

 Cumberland, ' Alndale,' and Westmorland, to make inquiries. The 

 commission for the deanery of Carlisle was delivered on 7 December 

 1668; those for the other deaneries on 14 September 1669. Bishop 

 Rainbow stated that as it belonged to his pastoral office to see the 

 service of God duly performed, His churches repaired and beautified, 

 and all things therein done in decency and order, it was his duty to take 

 notice of what had happened during the long discontinuance of church 

 government in these late times of war and rebellion. 'The churches of 

 this our diocese of Carlisle are become very ruinous, the Communion 

 plate and linnen plundered and stollen away, and many disorders com- 

 mitted to ye great dishonour of Almighty God, the scandall and offence 

 of all good Christian people and the breach of the ancient lawes of this 

 land.' The commissioners in the respective deaneries were empowered 

 to call before them churchwardens and parishioners, and to inform them- 

 selves ' of all the decayes, defects, ruines and incroachments w ch are in 

 any of the roofs, leads, windowes, walls, steeples, floores, pavements, 

 pulpitts, reading desks, seats and stalls in any of the said churches, 

 chappells or in any of their churchyards, houses, edifices, buildings and 

 grounds.' It was the duty of the commissioners also ' to see that the 

 said churches be provided of plate, pewter, linnen, and other things 

 necessary for the Communion Table, as likewise of bookes, cushions 

 and other things required for the pulpit and reading desk and other 

 uses.' In addition, inquiry was made about the temporal concerns 

 of the benefice, glebe lands, mansions, buildings, church stocks, 

 augmentations, legacies and other charitable uses. 1 To these episcopal 

 acts in 1668-9 must De ascribed the supply of the ornaments in 

 many parish churches and the recovery of much church property 

 lost or embezzled during the Commonwealth. 



While Bishop Rainbow was making strenuous efforts to build 

 up the church in his diocese, he was not unmindful of those who 

 had rejected him as chief pastor. It is well known that he was a 

 conciliatory prelate who did everything in his power to soften the 

 asperities of the penal code. But it was beyond his power to save 

 nonconformists from the consequences of resistance to the law ; it 

 was the civil magistrate who dealt with those who dissented from the 

 national religion. For this reason it is to the court of Quarter Sessions, 

 and not to the ecclesiastical courts, that we turn for a record of the 

 troubles of the various religious denominations at this period. The 

 followers of George Fox were the first to feel the rigour of the law. 

 The quakers were the only people who ostentatiously defied the new 

 enactments. In their ill-regulated enthusiasm they entered the parish 

 churches and denounced the lives and doctrines of the parish clergy in 

 the presence of their congregations. It was no rare thing for church- 

 wardens to have half a dozen quakers before the justices at Quarter 



Carl. Epis. Reg. Rainbow, ff. 460-1. 

 9 8 



